Alfredo Thiermann, “Radio-Activities: Architecture and Broadcasting in Cold War Berlin”

e-flux Architecture presents “Radio-Activities: Architecture and Broadcasting in Cold War Berlin,” a lecture by Alfredo Thiermann at e-flux on Tuesday, October 22 at 7pm.

In 1945, having occupied German territory, Soviet troops made two strategic moves: they dismantled the Deutschlandsender III radio transmission tower, the single tallest structure at the time in Europe, and they seized the Haus des Rundfunks in West Berlin, a monumental building designed by Hans Poelzig. These moves were crucial both symbolically and technically, as together they sparked what would become a veritable radio war between the Eastern and Western blocs during the Cold War. In this talk, I will present Radio-Activities, my recently published book, in which I investigate this spatial conflict by interrogating the political, technological, and environmental dimensions of architecture at a time when buildings began to interact with the remote transmission of information.

By its very nature, the medium of radio promised to evaporate the intrinsic material aspect of architecture; in fact, it did no such thing. By way of trans-scalar analyses, in the book, I pay particular attention to Berlin’s buildings, walls, transmission towers, factories, research institutions, and territorial organizations during the Cold War period, which enabled the production, reproduction, and transmission of sonic-based content across the divide of the Iron Curtain. In doing so I reveal under-researched continuities between politics, technology, media, and architecture, reframing notions of national and transnational boundaries. In Radio-Activities I interrogate the status and agency of buildings during a period—not unlike today’s—of increasingly hyperconnected, ubiquitous, and apparently invisible modes of coexistence.

“Radio-Activities: Architecture and Broadcasting in Cold War Berlin” is presented as part of e-flux Architecture Lectures, a monthly series inviting researchers and practitioners to discuss timely issues in contemporary architecture, theory, culture, and technology.

For more information, contact program@e-flux.com.

Accessibility                     
–Two flights of stairs lead up to the building’s front entrance at 172 Classon Avenue.          
–For elevator access, please RSVP to program@e-flux.com. The building has a freight elevator that leads into the e-flux office space. Entrance to the elevator is nearest to 180 Classon Ave (a garage door). We have a ramp for the steps within the space.                   
–e-flux has an ADA-compliant bathroom. There are no steps between the event space and this bathroom.